Thread by @pmdfoster

Almost a year into #Brexit but after today's meeting in Brussels between Frost and Sefcovic it feels like we're gone back in time. Threats and brinkmanship are ramping up again...it's all a bit Brenda from Bristol. So what's going on? What might happen? A quick Friday thread.. /1

Both sides put out gloomy statements today over the Northern Ireland Protocol -- the EU says UK is not engaging seriously with their proposals to reduce Irish Sea border frictions caused by the Irish Protocol. But for Frost, these proposals still miss the point /2

The UK wants a "fundamental" reform of the Protocol, essentially unravelling the basic formula...which is that NI stayed in the EU single market for goods. So if that's the plan, the EU's border offer (which the UK says isn't as good as advertised anyway) doesn't help /3

Which is why -- with the gaps this huge -- there is growing expectation that the UK will trigger Article 16 which is a 'safeguards' clause in the deal, attached below for ease of reference...worth re-reading because it's likely to become subject of heated debate /4

Because given UK ambitions to rewrite the Protocol root and branch (as set out in Command Paper in July) the fear in Brussels is that the UK will use Article 16 to disapply those bits of the deal that leave NI in the EU's legal and regulatory orbit...ie the deal/5

This would a pretty odd reading of the point of Article 16 -- I mean, why would the deal have a self-destruct clause in it that would enable one side to eviscerate it...for doing what it was designed to do? /6

Which is why it has rung alarm bells that Frost is shopping around for fresh legal advice to justify such a course...which @ft reported this week...but as @GeorgePeretzQC told me, is a stretch, to put it mildly. /7

ft.com/content/3f6c3f…

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC The UK well knows this...but it bets that by the time an arbitration panel has ruled against them, they will have demonstrated that actually their Command Paper works fine. That you don't really need this border the EU keep banging on about. /8

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC Which of course (since we're having a thread taking us back in time) takes us back to 2019, alternative arrangements, mutual enforcement etc. All of which was revived this week by Lord Frost and @Policy_Exchange (see this thread) /9

https://twitter.com/pmdfoster/status/1455167823479726082

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange Now. The EU aren't at their first NI #Brexit rodeo so they can see this cunning plan to establish 'facts on the ground' and are cooking up a pre-emptive strike, effectively. Which is to warn UK that they'll pull down the EU-UK trade deal /10

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange You can read @Mij_Europe on the thinking on this, but essentially the UK gets one year's notice period...so guess what 'ze clock is ticking' ...or rather 'ze beum is ticking' again.

We'll be back to 'no deal cliff-edges' again. Arrrrrgh. /11

https://twitter.com/Mij_Europe/status/1456520115814535186?s=20

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange @Mij_Europe But guess what...the UK can see this coming and (as @RaoulRuparel sets out here) perhaps calculates that a year is long enough to establish facts on the ground...the sun will still be rising in east, no-one will have died from eating British sausages./12

twitter.com/RaoulRuparel?r…

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange @Mij_Europe @RaoulRuparel But guess what...the EU can see that coming too. So they will be incentivised to make it hurt. They might not sit on their hands for a year....precisely so that the UK doesn't get the breathing space it is looking for. /13

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange @Mij_Europe @RaoulRuparel They will seek to pose a clear question to @BorisJohnson ...do you REALLY want to go back to no deal cliff-edges, to telling the voters (as inflation bites and supply chains groan) that you're picking a trade war with the EU? That #Brexit isn't, after all, done?

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange @Mij_Europe @RaoulRuparel @BorisJohnson Can we really be going back here? Seems mad, but as we've seen this week, this @BorisJohnson government has serious form for foot shooting -- and if the PM decides, it seems like there's no in the building to keep the trolley from crashing into bake bean pyramid. /15

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange @Mij_Europe @RaoulRuparel @BorisJohnson This would be even madder since, whatever Frost says, Northern Ireland really isn't up in arms over the writ of the ECJ -- an issue that was inserted late into the Command Paper in order to appease sovereignty obsessives in Westminster far more than Belfast /16

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange @Mij_Europe @RaoulRuparel @BorisJohnson And a big UK gambit to suspend the Protocol via Article 16 risk a lot for Northern Ireland

Since Frost can talk about 'mutual enforcement' but if there are no checks on Irish sea border, what is legal basis for North to South trade? Big companies will want to know that/17

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange @Mij_Europe @RaoulRuparel @BorisJohnson Frost will have to think carefully of the consequences of removing legal base for that trade.

On the other side, the Irish Govt -- in absence of any border in Irish Sea or North South -- may find the EU commission demanding additional surveillance, which lands on Irish biz./18

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange @Mij_Europe @RaoulRuparel @BorisJohnson All of which is to say that there a lot of delicate moving parts here...as we run into May elections in Northern Ireland that look likely to leave Unionism without claim to first 'first minister' title (even though they're actually co-equals) /19

@FT @GeorgePeretzQC @Policy_Exchange @Mij_Europe @RaoulRuparel @BorisJohnson Still, here we go again. I've long given up betting where this ends up, since that requires mind-reading the mercurial Mr Johnson, which is a fools errand.

History recalls that he stepped back in 2019. My bet is that, when pushed, he does so again. But we'll see.

Good weekend